


Scared (But In A Good Way)

by Allie_J



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Teenagers, Bucky is ... not, Bucky wears cat ears because important reasons, First Kiss, First Meeting, Guess what my favorite holiday is!!, Haunted House, M/M, Meet cute? Meet something, Oh seasonal writing - the only "deadline" my writer's mind will ever acknowledge, Pumpkin carving, Steve is a pumpkin carving boss, Steve is mostly not afraid, Suggestions of PTSD/Anxiety, The plot is: Halloween!, They live in suburban nowheresville because Brooklyn interferred with my crucial leaf pile plotpoint, Trick-or-treating (sorta), kissing in the dark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-30
Updated: 2015-10-30
Packaged: 2018-04-28 22:46:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5108372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allie_J/pseuds/Allie_J
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve runs into Bucky in a haunted house.  Literally.</p><p>(Read the tags, and Happy Halloween!!)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scared (But In A Good Way)

The way you handled yourself in a haunted house said a lot about you.

Steve usually ended up at the back of the line as his friends wove their way through, single file, around the dark corners. It was because he lingered. He liked to look at even the cheesiest haunted houses as art installations, the various scenes – decrepit mental hospital, abandoned carnival, human meat locker – all a reflection of culture and human nature in some way.

He thoughtfully considered every detail, and he was stoic, too. When a monster popped out at him, he appreciated the startle, the little thrill that ran up his spine and flushed his mind with adrenaline, but he was never scared. Not the way that Sam got, sometimes, jittery and panicky and reaching back to pull him in front of him in the line, clutching at the back of his shirt and literally using him as a human shield.

He might jump a little, let his eyes follow the actor as they slipped back into the darkness, and then continue. He was honestly a little surprised his friends kept inviting him out.

This haunted house was supposed to be different. It wasn’t a traditional, weave-through-dark-hallways-single-file house. Instead, it was what he would call an open concept – a series of connected rooms with no end and no beginning, set up in the vast basement of an old factory. A group was led down and locked in, and you wandered around in the dark.

The house billed it as something along the lines of “How long can you survive?,” but what that really meant to Steve was that it was timed. Stay down there long enough without losing your shit and you’d ‘survive,’ and then you’d be shooed upstairs to make room for the next paying group.

Evidently, though, people did chicken out. They were all provided with a safeword to use going in. There was even a little sign in the waiting area displaying the growing number who had given in and screamed it. It was currently up to 43.

He was admiring the sign, wondering how scared you had to be to both endure that kind of embarrassment and forfeit twenty bucks, when his friends’ conversation came into earshot again.

“Can they touch you?” he heard, recognizing Sharon’s urgent whisper.

“Nah,” Sam was saying. He always heaped on a thick layer of bravado before going into these kinds of things. “If they could, we’d have to sign a waiver.”

“Wait, you guys didn’t?” Steve said, chiming in as he turned around to face them. “They’re handing them out over there. No suing them for heart attacks, strokes, accidental dismemberment, permanent facial disfigure-“

“Oh shut up, Steve,” Sharon said, cutting him off with a little pout. “Just because you aren’t scared of anything.”

“I can’t wait for your review,” Sam added blithely. He picked up a poor impression of Steve’s voice. “’Hey guys, how cool was it that they used an angled mirror to make it look like that guy’s legs were really disappearing into the wood chipper in a spray of fake blood! That was really clever-!!’”

“It was,” Steve argued, frowning as he remembered that particular trick and how he’d all but ignored the screaming ‘victim’ to try and sort out how it worked. “You have to be really creative to put these things together. It takes a lot of good design.”

“Mm-hmm,” Sam replied, rolling his eyes. “Well, we know what you want to be when you grow up. Steve Rogers: #1 freaky haunted house consultant. Elevate your seasonal money trap from scary to artfully creepy.”

“Admit it,” Steve said, smirking a little. “I’d be good. You’d pay at least forty to cry your way through my haunted house.”

“Sixty,” Sharon piqued in. Some of the fear had relaxed out of her features, and she clung to Sam’s arm almost cheerfully. “There’s one good thing about Steve not being afraid of anything. He can protect us!”

Sam snorted at that, tugging her arm a little closer to his side.

“Babe,” he said, the bravado returning in full force, “I’m all the protection you’re gonna need.”

 

\--- --- --- --- --- ---

 

“Sweet baby Jesus!” Sam squeaked, jumping away from the rotting corpse that had just burst open a shower curtain inside a chipped claw-foot tub. Sharon stumbled back with him, seemingly attached to his shoulder, and whimpered.

Steve bit back the urge to chuckle at them, hanging back to give himself plenty of room to watch and wander. The house would be better, he decided, if it had a more coherent theme. So far he’d seen a creepy little girl, beckoning him closer with a filthy teddy bear hanging from her hand, a clown with a chainsaw and runny make-up, a hillbilly in blood-stained overalls …

None of it really made any sense. But then, he guessed, it probably wasn’t supposed to.

Without a clear line of people to follow, he lost Sam and Sharon pretty quickly. This didn’t phase him much – he was pretty sure he’d connect with them again in a few minutes. After all, this basement could only be so big.

He found himself wandering into a new room, one dimly lit by a single hanging bulb. It was swaying slightly, casting moving shadows over the wall, which, he realized, was covered in grisly severed body parts. Arms, legs, feet, spines – most of it had the tell-tale rubber sheen that told him immediately they were fake, but still. It was creepy.

He took another step forward, about to take a closer look at the torso hanging on a hook from the ceiling, when there was a huge bang next to him. The door to a shoddy refrigerator burst open, and a dark figure with a red skull face jumped in front of him, stopping just inches from his eyes.

He heard himself yelp, and then he was running, too frightened for the moment to even comment on how excellent the timing had been on that one –

And then he slammed into someone, a person, a warm body, and fell roughly to the floor.

He landed on his hands and knees, wincing. The basement floor was nothing more than rough cement, and it skinned his palms. As he leaned back, slowly taking stock, he realized he must’ve gone down with his right knee first. It was in worse shape than the left, the fabric of his jeans torn straight through. In the dim light, he could already see black fluid dampening the frayed edges, feel the wet roll of a few drops sliding down his shin.

He looked up, because the person he’d slammed into was still there. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting – another actor in costume, he guessed, or an awkward patron looking down at him, unsure what to do.

Instead, the person – a guy, he realized, by the width of their shoulders – hadn’t noticed him. He was staring straight forward, transfixed, his eyes locked on a display showcased in the corner of the room. A girl was strapped down onto a thick wooden chair, writhing and straining against her bonds. A man in a black rubber apron, raised butcher knife in hand, was circling her slowly, as if deciding which limb to sever first.

Steve shifted, gingerly trying to right himself without putting too much weight on his knee. It was only then, when he moved, that the guy finally seemed to snap out of it, shifting his attention away from the actors and the backdrop of fake body parts and glancing down at him.

His eyes widened in the dark, but there was just enough light for Steve to see that they were pale. His hair was a little disheveled, long and pulled back, and his mouth had fallen open in a soft ‘o’ at the sight of the strange teenager crumpled on the floor next to him. He looked almost as horrified staring down at Steve as he had at the actors.

He considered his options. His knee hurt like hell, and the only person available to help him wasn’t exactly sending the friendliest vibes. Maybe it had been a bad idea, letting himself get separated.

Deciding he had no real choice, Steve slowly lifted his hand, holding it out and hoping the stranger he’d slammed into might take pity and help him up.

The other boy – he was his age, maybe a little older – blinked at the hand. His eyes shifted downward, and he caught sight of the blood, freely staining Steve’s jeans now in a messy burst of red trailing from his knee.

He saw the blood and, light eyes widening further, turned and ran out of the room.

Steve let his hand hover uselessly in the air for a moment, stunned. After a moment, though, he got back to the business of trying to stand up, and limped off in the same direction.

There were only a few minutes left. He’d barely made it into the next room when the lights switched on above him, and a slow, creepy rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ starting playing. The cue that it was over.

He’d ‘survived’.

 

\--- --- --- --- --- ---

 

Sam didn’t hide his amusement when he found out about the skinned knee, although, to his credit, he did wait until Steve was properly patched up before he let in on the teasing.

“What happened?” he asked, holding back his laughter. “Did you finally snap and just decide to punch one of the guys in the face?”

“Be nice,” Sharon admonished. She handed Steve a bag of frozen peas scavenged from his freezer, frowning. “It’s swelling up.”

Evidently, the irony of nerves-of-steel Steve coming out of a haunted house bleeding was too much for his best friend. Still, he took it in stride, grinning along with him.

“You’re not gonna believe this, but I was actually running away,” he said gamely. “This skull guy got me really good.”

He didn’t bother to mention the guy he’d run into, the one with eyes like a deer in headlights. His presence didn’t add to the story. There was nothing to say, really.

Still, his mind kept circling back to him. The empty, hollowed out way he’d simply stared. The way he’d paled at the sight of Steve’s real blood.

There was something more there, a kind of fear that haunted houses could never recreate en masse. Those eyes stayed with him.

At least, for a few days. Then the swelling went down, and he went back to school, and life went on.

 

\--- --- --- --- --- ---

 

Most people carved pumpkins when they were kids, then stopped until they had kids of their own.

Steve had little patience for those kinds of people.

He made a delicate cut, peeling back the thick outer skin and revealing more of the soft, pale orange flesh underneath. There was something about trading paper for a three-dimensional canvas – a real thing, messy and curved and imperfect – that was deeply satisfying to him. It was like merging together art and nature. And it was fun.

And he was kind of good at it, thanks to his years of practice. His jack-o’-lanterns had become somewhat of a neighborhood fixture every Halloween, lined up along the edge of his porch to greet trick-or-treaters. The house would’ve felt empty without them.

He was carving outside on the porch, because for all his careful incisions, this was messy work, and his mother had forbidden him to smear pumpkin guts all over their kitchen.

He was sticking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth, focusing – cut out too much, and the whole thing could collapse in on itself – when he noticed him.

A guy, dressed in dark clothing, staring at him from across the street.

His muscles tensed immediately, but Steve tried not to look up, to show that he’d noticed him. He kept his eyes on the pumpkin instead, glancing up only briefly every few seconds.

He didn’t recognize him. And he was still just standing there, staring.

Goosebumps rose on his forearms. This was becoming a little creepy. Steve wondered if he should put the pumpkin down, stand up, see what he wanted. He did have a knife. Well - scalpel.

He was working up the nerve to do just that, feeling restless and jumpy under the stranger’s gaze, when the other boy started to walk over, crossing the street.

Steve took in a steadying breath, waiting. As he neared him, he could make out details – long dark hair, messily pulled back. As he stopped in front of him, light eyes. Blue grey, like the chill autumn air.

It was the guy from the haunted house. Steve set his scalpel down slowly, fighting to keep his face from showing the thousand questions that were racing through his mind.

“Hey,” the boy said. He kept his head down, his eyes mostly averted, hands stuffed deeply into the pockets of his dark hoodie.

“Hey,” Steve said back. Up close and in better light, and without a fresh burning pain in his knee, he could see that this guy was actually really handsome, with a strong jaw and thick lips that he seemed to have a nervous habit of licking before he spoke.

“I, uhm,” he continued, shoving his hands impossibly further down into his pockets. “You were at that haunted house last Saturday.”

Yes, Steve’s mind replied wonderingly. And now you’re at my actual house?

“I was just walking by and I thought I,” the other boy continued. He seemed nervous, really nervous, which confused Steve, because why bother to come over and talk to him then? “I thought I recognized you.”

“Yeah,” Steve replied slowly. “I was there.”

An awkward silence fell between them, and Steve watched as he shifted his weight from foot to foot.

“You ran into me,” he continued, his words rushing together a little. “And you fell and I – god, I was an ass, I didn’t even help you up and I just wanted to say, I’m sorry.”

“You weren’t an ass,” Steve found himself saying. He wanted to add, you seemed really scared, but that didn’t seem to be a good thing to say, from one guy to another.

“I was,” the other boy insisted harshly. “You were bleeding. Is it – are you okay?”

Steve glanced down absently at his scabbed knee, although it was hidden underneath the fabric of his jeans.

“Yeah,” he replied easily. “I just skinned it. No big deal.”

“I’m sorry,” the other boy repeated, firmly.

“It wasn’t your fault or anything,” Steve shot back. He wasn’t exactly sure why, but he really didn’t want this guy to feel guilty over him. “I mean, I ran into you. I could’ve knocked you over, and then I’d be the one apologizing.”

“You wouldn’t have run into me if I hadn’t been just standing there,” the brunet said harshly. There was real venom in the words, and the way the other boy was taking this so seriously – and being so rough on himself – didn’t sit well with him.

“Well, hey, no big deal,” Steve said, trying to make his voice as cheerful as he could without making it also sound fake. “What’s a haunted house without a little blood, right?”

The other boy didn’t answer for a moment, his frown only deepening.

“Thanks,” he said finally, sighing a little. “I really am sorry.”

He leaned down, extending his hand, and Steve took it. Their eyes met for a moment, and the brunet looked away, his cheeks flushed red from the cold.

He released his hand, and Steve picked up his scalpel again, thinking that would be that. Except the other boy was lingering, still bent down into his space, his eyes fixated on something.

He’d seen the pumpkin.

“Holy shit,” he said under his breath. Steve watched as it slipped from his lips in a thin wisp of white.

“It’s – yeah,” Steve said, awkwardly. Now he was the one who wanted to avert his eyes.

It was a little bit ambitious, for a jack-o’-lantern. It was a graveyard scene, the crosses and markers jutting up from the rolling ground at odd angles. A rickety fence curved in the background, with the outline of an arching black cat on top. Above it, thin clouds rolled over a partially obscured full moon.

“That’s fucking incredible,” the other boy said, clearly awed, and now Steve’s cheeks burned in full force. “Are you one of those champion pumpkin carvers that do like, competitions? Like on the Travel channel? My Mom watches those.”

“Uhh, no,” Steve said, tightening his grip on the scalpel. “I just do it for fun. You only get one chance every year, right?”

The brunet didn’t respond. He was still staring, awestruck, at the pumpkin.

“I wish I could do something like that,” he whispered. A loose strand of dark hair fell across his cheek, and he absently tucked it back behind his ear as he stared.

God, he really was handsome. Even his eyelashes were long. Steve didn’t know why that hadn’t stood out more when he’d first seen him in the haunted house.

“The point isn’t to be good,” Steve found himself saying. “It’s to have fun. It’s pumpkin carving, I mean, it’s not – an art form.”

“Could’ve fooled me,” the other boy said reverently. He finally pulled back, straightening up.

“You can do one, if you want,” Steve said casually, not thinking as the words spilled from his lips. “I have more. A few are even hollowed out already.”

“Do one?” the brunet repeated doubtfully.

Oh god, Steve thought, what had he just suggested? Hey, handsome stranger, want to sit on my porch and carve pumpkins with me like a twelve year old?

But it was too late. He had to follow through.

“Yeah,” he said, a blush burning at the top of his cheeks. “Carve a pumpkin?”

The other boy frowned dubiously, shifting his weight as he had when he’d first walked up. Steve only hoped he would let him down easily. Politely. Not make him feel completely pathetic before he walked off again.

“I can’t take one of your pumpkins,” he mumbled, finally.

“It’s not a big deal,” Steve said lightly. And it wasn’t, really. “I have like, six. I think. No one’s counting.”

Another awkward silence fell between them, and Steve found his heart picking up pace in anticipation. Not that he had any idea what he’d do if he did decide to stay and carve with him, but – he really was handsome.

“I only know how to do the kind with triangle eyes,” the other boy muttered. He looked away, as if pumpkin carving was a widespread and valued skill he was embarrassed to have never picked up.

“So do that,” Steve replied easily. A small, hopeful smile played at the corner of his mouth. “Like I said, it’s not a competition. It’s for fun.”

He watched as the taller boy continued to hesitate in front of him, shifting his weight uneasily as he decided. Then, finally, he stepped forward, walking around Steve to the corner where he’d stashed his fresh, unfinished pumpkins.

He picked between them for a moment, and Steve grinned when he selected the one that he’d intended to do next. It was tall and thin with a small base, not fat and round like a traditional jack-o’-lantern. He liked the ones with a unique shape to them.

The brunet lifted it easily – it was already hollowed out, ready to carve, and as such not heavy at all – and carried it over to where Steve was carving on the top step. He sat down, settling the pumpkin in his lap, bracing it between his thighs and reaching down to pick up a knife.

Steve watched as he stabbed it roughly through the pumpkin’s shell, sawing across to make the first line. He wondered if this was how it would be – carving pumpkins silently, side by side, in the cool air – until the other boy suddenly spoke, light eyes still intent on the rough cut he was making.

“I shouldn’t have been there,” he said. His voice was low, quiet, almost as if he were talking to himself. Steve knew, of course, that he wasn’t.

“Where?” he asked, even though it was obvious, based on his incredibly limited knowledge of this guy’s life. “The haunted house?”

The other boy nodded. He stiffly pulled out the knife, repositioning it to make another cut.

“It was too soon,” he said. He licked his upper lip a little, concentrating on the line he was making, sawing slowly back and forth. Steve thought he might just leave it at that, but after a moment he continued. “That’s why I froze up.”

He blinked at that, not sure what to say, but longing to say something all the same. He turned his attention back to his own pumpkin, shaving away the top layer of rubbery skin to expose the softer flesh underneath, creating the moon. It felt easier, somehow, to talk when both of them were focused on something else.

“So why’d you go, then?” Steve finally asked. It was the obvious question, but easier to ask than the others crowding his mind.

“My friends wanted me to,” he replied. His voice was suddenly a little too casual, a little too numb, and that made Steve pause with scalpel in hand to turn and look at the profile of his face.

“Do your friends always make you do things you don’t want to do?” Steve asked. His tone of voice was harsh, too harsh for a person and a situation he knew nothing about, but something about this conversation flared a sudden protectiveness in him.

The other boy turned to glance at him, too, but when he saw that Steve’s eyes were already on him, he looked quickly back down at his pumpkin.

“They didn’t make me,” he said abruptly. “They – it wasn’t like that. They just wanted me to go out. Do stuff. Fun stuff.”

He rolled the pumpkin a little in his lap. Steve saw that he was starting on the second triangle eye.

“They didn’t realize,” he went on. He stabbed the knife into the pumpkin with unnecessary force. “Hell, I didn’t even realize. Or, well, I did, but – I guess I ignored it. I wanted to go. I wanted it to be okay.”

Steve watched as his frown deepened, and a little surge of panic swelled in his own chest. Now he definitely didn’t know what to say, what was appropriate to ask, what he could assume and what he shouldn’t assume.

“Haunted houses like that aren’t for everyone,” he said, finally, lamely, because he didn’t want to risk saying something presumptive or offensive. “I mean, not everyone enjoys being scared.”

The brunet didn’t look up for a moment, focusing instead on stabbing out a third, slightly smaller triangle in the center of the pumpkin’s face. He pushed out the little nose like a puzzle piece.

“Do you?” he asked, his voice a little softer now.

“Do I what?” Steve asked. He realized he’d been staring for a little too long, and he forced himself to turn his attention back to his own pumpkin, tracing the delicate curves that would become wispy clouds.

“Enjoy being scared?” the other boy replied, parroting back his words.

Steve felt his cheeks burn a little, which made no sense, because the question wasn’t all that personal. It just felt that way.

“Sure,” he said, after a hesitant pause. “I like being scared. But in a good way.”

Next to him, the brunet nodded slowly.

“I wish I knew what that was like,” he said, his voice so quiet Steve could barely hear him.

They continued to carve in silence for another few minutes. It was a silence that, for Steve, wasn’t awkward, but also wasn’t exactly warm and comfortable. It felt a little sad, like the trees in his yard that had already dropped most of their leaves, leaving them bare and colorless.

“Done,” the other boy said suddenly, pulling a wide, grin-shaped piece out of his pumpkin. Steve looked over, smiling.

It was simple. Triangle eyes, triangle nose, wide smile with a single square tooth.

“I like it,” Steve said, and he did. “It’s traditional.”

“I’m pretty sure a kindergartener could do better, if we let them play with knifes,” the brunet deadpanned. He lifted the pumpkin up off his lap with both hands, appraising it with a skeptical frown.

“Oh, come on,” Steve said cheerfully. “It’s – cute.”

The other boy turned toward him, his light eyes, slightly wide with surprise, meeting his. Steve looked down a little, hoping his earlier blush didn’t return. Why did he have to choose the word ‘cute,’ of all fucking adjectives?

“Just toss it,” the other boy said. He sat the pumpkin down, standing.

“No way,” Steve shot back immediately. He had to look up, now, to talk to him. “Take it home with you.”

“Nah,” he answered. He shifted his shoulders inside his hoodie, stuffing his hands back into his pockets. “Thanks, though. For letting me do it. It was – fun.”

“No problem,” Steve replied. He smiled up at him, trying to keep it casual. He realized he didn’t want the other boy to go, but – there had really been no reason for him to stay in the first place.

“I’ll see you around,” he said lightly. Then he turned, making his way back up the driveway.

After a moment, Steve picked up his scalpel, intent on focusing again on his work, intending to shove the swelling tension in his chest down and address it later. He almost succeeded, before a sudden impulse jerked him free.

“Wait!” he called out, cursing himself as soon as the words left his lips. It had been such a nice, casual, easy goodbye.

The other boy was just within earshot. He turned around, eyebrow raised.

“What’s your name?” Steve shouted, after a moment’s hesitation, because he’d trapped himself now into saying something.

The brunet blinked a few times, then smiled. Or at least, Steve thought he smiled – it was a little hard to tell from a distance.

“Bucky!” the other boy called out in response.

Steve furrowed his brow a bit at the odd name, but then found himself smiling too.

“Steve!” he shouted back.

Bucky’s eyes lingered on him for a moment. He raised his hand, waving briefly before turning back around.

Steve watched his back for another few seconds as he slowly disappeared up the driveway. Before he could be caught, he made himself look back down, picking up his scalpel and resuming work on the pumpkin.

It took his smile a little longer to fade.

 

\--- --- --- --- --- ---

 

A few days later, Steve was raking leaves in his yard. He’d left it too long, waiting until the grass was practically carpeted with a thick blanket of red and orange and brown, and that meant more work all at once.

He liked it better this way, though. There was something satisfying about pulling together a pile as high as your waist.

He was just finishing up a particularly impressive mound when he noticed a familiar figure walking slowly up the street. At least, he thought it was familiar – there had to be a lot of teenage guys walking around in dark hoodies. Maybe not quite as many with their hair pulled back in a loose bun.

Steve ducked his head. He knew it was stupid to feel so shy – worse case scenario, Bucky would see him staring and wave his hand, and Steve would wave back, and it would be perfectly fine – but he didn’t want to look desperate. He wanted to look very absorbed in his leaf raking.

Still, he glanced up through his eyelashes a few times, and that was when he noticed Bucky look up himself and stop. His eyes locked on something – not Steve, something behind him – and he narrowed his eyes, mouth falling open a little. Then he redirected his path and curved in toward Steve’s driveway.

Steve raked a little harder, trying not to make it obvious that he’d noticed this. He wanted to look surprised when Bucky walked up to him.

When he heard the soft crunch of leaves that signaled Bucky’s approach, he finally looked up, smiled. Casually, he hoped.

“Hey,” he said, straightening his back. “If you’re back for more pumpkin carving, I’m –“

Bucky pointed stiffly toward Steve’s porch.

“That,” he said, slowly, “Is not acceptable.”

Steve followed his gaze, blood rushing to his cheeks when he realized what Bucky was pointing out. On his porch, just like every Halloween, there was a row of elaborately carved pumpkins. The finished graveyard scene pumpkin was there, along with four others that Steve had carefully crafted over the weekend.

Except that this year, at the end, there was a sixth that stood out. It had triangle eyes and a wide, toothy, simple grin.

“I told you to toss it,” Bucky said, darkly. His tone was very serious, and that made Steve a little nervous. 

“I’m not going to throw away a perfectly good pumpkin,” Steve said back, defensively. 

“It looks ridiculous,” Bucky snapped. And he did have a little bit of a point there, Steve mused. It didn’t look ridiculous exactly but – it did stand out. A little.

But he liked that. And he liked looking at the pumpkin, liked remembering it braced between his thighs as he carved, liked recalling the low, hesitant gentleness of his voice as he talked to him.

Steve wrinkled his nose, trying to come up with a defense that mentioned none of those things.

“Well,” he said, finally, “If a pumpkin art critic stops by, I’ll just tell them I’m exploring a minimalist phase.”

Bucky snorted at that, the tension in his shoulders finally relaxing.

“I’m coming back and smashing it on Halloween night,” he muttered, giving Steve a dirty, warning look.

Yes, Steve thought suddenly. Please come back. At night.

“Fine,” he snapped back, instead. But he gave Bucky a half-smile, lifting his rake and resuming his work.

Bucky’s eyes followed his movement, shifting over to the giant pile of leaves Steve had managed to amass in the past hour.

“Impressive,” he said, his voice so low Steve could barely hear it. There was something else there, something in his voice – it was almost teasing, suggestive. For a moment, Steve flattered himself by thinking it was meant for him, but then he noticed the almost predatory way Bucky was staring at the pile –

“No,” he said suddenly, realization overwhelming him. “This took me, like, forty five minutes –“

But it was too late. He watched as Bucky suddenly launched himself forward, kicking his legs up and throwing himself into the pile. Steve dropped the rake, mouth falling open.

There was only one way to respond.

Steve ran forward himself, mirroring Bucky as he jumped in behind him. He meant to land next to the other boy, but the leaves were slippery under his feet, and his legs skidded out wildly. He panicked, reaching out –

And found a fistful of Bucky’s dark hoodie.

But there was too much momentum, and Bucky wasn’t prepared to brace him. Instead, Steve ended up pushing him down on his back, crushing him into the leaves. He froze, hovering over the taller boy.

He was too close, and Bucky’s hoodie was soft and worn in his fist, the fabric surprisingly warm. The leaves towered around his shoulders, isolating them, and Bucky was staring up at him, eyes wide.

Steve wondered, if he let his eyes fall half-closed, if he leaned down, slowly, just a little –

But he didn’t see, at first, that Bucky’s eyes weren’t just wide with surprise. There was something else in them, something worse, and his eyes were blank and staring the way they had been in the haunted house.

When Steve saw it, he loosened his grip, started to pull back -

But he was a few seconds too late.

Suddenly, Bucky slapped his hand away, twisting underneath him. Steve fell back on his knees immediately, giving him all the space he could, but the other boy still struggled wildly to get up, as if he were coming after him.

“Bucky, I’m –“ Steve began.

But the apology died on his lips as the other boy stood, brushing the dry leaves off his front with unnecessary violence.

“It’s fine,” Bucky said stiffly, cutting him off. They were practiced words.

“No, I’m –“ Steve said, trying to start again.

“Sorry about your leaves,” the brunet snapped. And then he had shoved his hands back in his hoodie, and he was walking away.

Steve watched him go, drawing in slow breaths and trying not to think hateful thoughts about how stupid he was for letting it happen. He shoved absently at the leaves, and they flew up only a few inches, not at all satisfying his need to kick something over.

He finally stood up himself, brushing off the leaves slowly. He sighed, sparing a brief glance at the out-of-place pumpkin at the end of his porch before picking up his rake again.

 

\--- --- --- --- --- ---

 

It was Halloween night, and Steve was curled up on the couch, huddled in a blanket and watching Hocus Pocus. He shoved a handful of popcorn in his mouth, watching as the black cat Binx came back to life after being run over by a bus, slow re-inflating like a furry balloon.

The doorbell rang.

Steve blinked, pausing the movie before hesitating awkwardly. He checked his phone – it was eleven minutes to midnight. Trick-or-treating had long since wrapped up, and there was no reason for anyone to be at their door this late.

It could be a prank. But then, kids playing pranks weren’t usually polite enough to ring the bell and announce their presence.

After thinking it over for a moment, he reluctantly got up, the blanket falling from his shoulders. He walked to the front door, sucking in a long breath for courage before he flicked on the porch light and drew back the curtain to peek through the window.

He cursed, letting the curtain fall back immediately.

It was Bucky.

Before his nerves could get the best of him, he opened the front door, his heart already racing.

The other boy looked out of place under the bright light, shifting his weight and refusing, at first, to look directly at Steve. He was wearing another dark hoodie and skinny jeans – that must be the staple of his wardrobe, he reasoned. Dark hoodies. But there was something else.

A pair of furry black cat ears were poised on top of his head. On anyone else, Steve would’ve found them silly, or cliché, but on Bucky, as part of his casual, dark ensemble – they looked oddly fitting.

Bucky finally looked up, following Steve’s eyes to the top of his head.

“Like them?” he asked. He reached back behind his head, wiggling the headband a little so the ears bounced. “I borrowed ‘em from my sister.”

He had whiskers, too, three little lines drawn on either side of his nose.

Steve wanted to drag him over the threshold and straight up his bedroom. But, based on their last encounter, Steve doubted that was going to happen. Maybe he was just here for another apology.

“Trick-or-treat?” Bucky asked, meekly, when Steve didn’t respond. He hesitantly held out his hand, cupping his palm.

“I hate to break this to you, but trick-or-treating ended like, four hours ago,” Steve said, his voice convincingly dry. That was a miracle, because it was getting hard for him to breathe like a normal human being.

“Mmm, no,” Bucky said slowly. He pulled his phone from his pocket, checking the time. “I still have… seven minutes before Halloween is over. I’m perfectly in my rights to trick-or-treat.”

Steve rolled his eyes at that, but he let a little smile grace his lips. He ducked to the side, where a big bowl of leftover candy was still stashed next to the door. He fished out one of his favorites, a KitKat bar – fitting, he thought.

He held it out to Bucky, since he evidently had no bag to drop it into.

“Only because I like the cat ears,” he added.

Bucky took the candy by its bright red wrapper, letting it dangle hesitantly in his hand for a moment. Then he handed it back to Steve.

“Actually,” he said, lowering his eyes again, just barely looking up at him through his lashes, “I was hoping for – a different kind of treat?”

Steve’s breath lodged in his throat, and he swallowed, hard. Everything about the way Bucky asked – the sheepish way he averted his eyes, the blush blooming above the drawn-on whiskers, the way he licked his lips nervously as he waited for him to answer – it all pointed toward one thing.

Steve wasn’t sure he could believe it. But then, he wasn’t one to throw away a perfect opportunity, even if it was a risky one.

He ducked back inside the house, dropping the KitKat in the bowl of candy. He hesitated only briefly before he raised his hand, flicking off the porch light.

When he looked back, Steve could only see the outline of Bucky’s body, his dark clothing blending well into the night. But his jack-o’-lanterns – well, his, and the one with triangle eyes – gave enough flickering light to cast his face in a warm orange glow.

Steve finally shut the front door, stepping outside.

“Can I touch you?” he asked, as he took a step forward. He raised his hand tentatively, waiting.

He saw the movement of Bucky’s head as he nodded, and he closed the distance between them, resting his hand on the other boy’s warm chest. He could feel Bucky’s heart hammering underneath the soft fabric, and he tried to resist the urge to smile at the fact that they were both so terrified.

When Bucky didn’t move away, he leaned a little closer, letting his hand drift slowly up to his shoulder.

“Is this what it feels like?” the other boy whispered, suddenly. 

Steve blinked in the almost-darkness, his hand freezing.

“What?” he whispered back. His mind had gone almost blank in the past few seconds, and it was a struggle to think.

“Being scared?” Bucky asked quietly. “But – in a good way?”

Steve smiled to himself, licking his lips one final time before he leaned forward, lifting himself up on his tip-toes in the dark.

Bucky’s mouth was warm and open against his, and Steve nearly collapsed into it, his stomach sinking deliciously as the other boy arched his larger body around him, slipping a hand around his waist, pulling them together.

He let his hand continue wandering, moving from Bucky’s shoulder to the back of his neck, his fingers snaking their way into his long hair. They went higher and higher, until Steve clutched them and pulled gently, and the other boy whimpered into his mouth.

Neither one noticed as the cat ears fell clumsily to the ground.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Halloween ... ^^v


End file.
